Wednesday, December 30, 2015

Still Life with Woodpecker* is not exactly as advertised. The back of the
book claims it “is sort of a love story that takes place inside a pack of Camel
cigarettes” (Robbins, back cover). Knowing Tom Robbins’ quirkiness, I figured
he’d be just the guy to write a novel that literally involved two cigarettes
falling in love. Turns out, it’s actually about two unlikely lovers (an exiled
princess, Leigh-Cheri, and a dynamite-obsessed outlaw, Bernard) who bond
through symbolism in the cig’s package while separated.

I fell in
love with Robbins when I read Even Cowgirls Get the Blues. He creatively infuses his novels with feminism that
empowers women and men. He also
really likes to talk about sex. This particular novel touches on both the
burdens and wonders of female reproduction. Robbins’ female characters use
their womanhood to their advantage instead of allowing biology and society to bring
them down. Yet men are not shunned in this process—they have a role. For
instance, Robbins revises the princess story prototype, having the princess play
the hero. Leigh-Cheri says, “‘Fairy tales and myths are dominated by accounts
of rescued princesses…isn’t it about time that a princess returned the favor”
(Robbins, 16)? Still, Bernard does not lose his heroic attributes. He doesn’t
want to “save” her or affirm her every thought; he challenges her and picks
apart her ideas, which ultimately helps her refine them.

The best
way to describe Robbins’ works as a whole is to compare him to Vonnegut.
Robbins is similar to Vonnegutin that he employs peculiar metaphors that
sometimes involve cheap puns (although they never fail to make you giggle).
He’s similar to Vonnegutin that his books are interconnected and he leaves little
Easter Eggs in each to create that link. He’s similar to Vonnegut in that he’s
socially conscious and makes poetic digs at established systems. He’s similar
to Vonnegutin that he uses ongoing jokes within each story à la Arrested Development. He’s similar to Vonnegut in that he
introduces a preposterous predicament, unintended to be taken literally, and
somehow makes the reader incredibly curious as to what will happen next, even
though anything could happen next
because he’s operating outside the realm of external reality. And he’s similar
to Vonnegutin that each scene has some existential import—asking big questions
like “Who knows how to make love stay” (Robbins,
4)? He’s not similar to Vonnegut in
that Vonnegut has a heavy science-fiction streak while Robbins’ esotericism is
more of this world. That being said, if you enjoy Vonnegut, chances are you’ll
enjoy Robbins, and vice versa.

I clearly admire
Robbins’ work and I think he’s a pretty chill guy IRL. He makes fantastical
tales relatable and serves satire on a platter well-done. Still, I enjoyed Even Cowgirls Get the Bluesbetter than
Woodpecker. Perhaps having already been exposed to his style I was less shocked
by his skills and thus slightly less impressed. So, Still Life with Woodpecker earns 3 out of 5 camel humps.
While the story has plenty of Robbins-pizzazz, there were moments when I was
not as engaged with the Camel-box symbolism and wished it had been a story of
two literal cigarettes falling in love. If you’re a Robbins-virgin, I recommend
Cowgirls—it has the same basic
feminist values appealing to both sexes but packs a bigger punch.

*Robbins, Tim. Still
Life with Woodpecker. New York: Bantam Dell, 1980. Print.

Wednesday, December 16, 2015

Meet Monkey, my thirteen-year-old brother. His real name is
Treyson (“third” “son”), but when he was born I didn’t like that name. I had a
bad teacher named Mrs. Rayson and a bully in my class named Trey, so I
channeled my inner preteen brat and renamed him Tanner, which has served as his
name ever since. A few years ago I nicknamed him Monkey because he’s little and
always hangs on bigger people like the aforementioned primate. When Monk has
short hair he looks like this...

and when he has long hair and
makes this face, he looks like Robert De Niro.

I’m 12.5 years older than him
because he was an accident child, so our relationship is unique. When he came
into the world I was old enough to realize that being an ass-hat to your younger
siblings is actually pretty wack and I was young enough to be the cool, suave
older sister. I really like my brother, he’s arguably my favorite primate on
the planet, but let me be clear: I do not want to raise him. I get to take him
to movies and stay up late with him and break the rules. I don’t have to dole
out punishment or make sure he gets to school on time or question why he
doesn’t eat his veggies. Dave Eggers, author of A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius* did not have that
choice. At age 21, his family fell apart when both of his parents died within
five weeks of each other. His mother’s death was imminent, as she had been
suffering from gastric cancer, while his father’s death was relatively
surprising. Dave was forced to become primary caregiver for his youngest
brother Toph, who was eight at the time of his parent’s death. I don’t know
about you guys, but at age 21 I was learning the art of a mixed drink, not the
art of convincing little kids that brushing your teeth is important. Admittedly,
I had to Google “what do eight year olds do” to finish the last part of the
previous sentence. I didn’t find anything interesting, so I guess I’m going the
eight-year-olds-probably-brush-their-teeth-or-at-least-they-should route.

Dave’s transition from playful
older brother to roommate/father figure was as tumultuous as you’d expect. What
you don’t necessarily expect is Dave’s gripping prose. He’s straddling the
threshold of adulthood/responsibility and youth/recklessness and he
unhesitatingly lobotomizes himself for readers, allowing us to penetrate the
depths of his struggles and confusion. He writes with a manic-depressive tone, excitedly
portraying his predicament as an opportunity in one breath and dejectedly
reflecting on the potential martyrdom of his twenties in another. On the one
hand, he has “this amazing chance to right the wrongs of [his] own upbringing”
(Eggers, 117). Toph’s “brain is [his] laboratory” where Dave can input his own
life views and raise Toph in a way that specifically corrects the mistakes his
own parents made (Eggers, 49). On the other hand, this duty to rightly-raise
his kin leaves no margin for error. No pressure or anything. Dave is
overwhelmed with guilt as he (semi-jokingly) questions whether his poor
cooking/cleaning skills and his inability to show up anywhere on time will
result in Toph growing up to be a mass murderer or pet torturer. Toph is a
responsibility that is sometimes a burden despite the fact that Dave loves him
tremendously.

Dave’s life is worth reading in and
of itself but what made the memoir the critically acclaimed bestseller that it
is was Dave’s ability to be terribly funny amidst his terrible tragedies. He’s
a self-conscious smart ass who manages to even make the typically bland
Copyrights page laugh-out-loud amusing. He combines Nick Flynn’s poetic insight
in Another Bullshit Night in Suck City
with Joseph Heller’s satirical witticisms in Catch-22. He’s comedic in the way he writes and the way he
interacts with others in real life. For instance, he starts a fringe magazine
with his friends that runs segments like “What’s Hot/What’s Not”. “What’s Hot”
lists things like the sun and lava (molten). “What’s Not” lists things like a
cold beverage and lava (hardened) (Eggers, 172).

Still, Dave's comedy does not
shroud his brutal honesty. He’s talking about really sad stuff in really
intimate ways and he doesn’t shy away from explaining things as they really are.
When he walks into a room, he paints a blatant picture of what everyone is
thinking, saying, and feeling. And sometimes it’s ugly. But it’s true. There
are multiple layers to his reaction to his parent’s death and he won’t stop
until he picks through them all. He honors parts of his parent’s lives while
recognizing their flaws. He admits that while his situation is awful, there is
a celebrity associated with orphan-ism, a “good brother” status that comes with raising Toph, and an advantage to playing the “tragic guy” card. He
obsessively combs through these conflicting emotions, showing the reader how
unhinged he is by feeling all of these things at once. Furthermore, the
death of his parents and the darkness that follows him like a cloud thereafter
produces a kind of hypochondria where he fears that terrible things will
continue to happen to him and his friends. This transmutes into a belief that
he deserves these terrible things.
The man is taking a psychological beating.

When I originally picked up this
book-- at the astute recommendation of my book-loving friend Shreya—I thought
the title was merely goofy and dramatic. Eggers is both goofy and dramatic… but
the story is truly heartbreaking and the writing is staggeringly genius. It
resonated with me by reminding me of my dear relationship with my youngest brother (Pic on left: 2015, reasonably spaced eyebrows. Pic on right: 2005, questionably spaced eyebrows).

Nevertheless, I think that it will resonate with most readers because of
its openness. A writer who is sincere in his struggles and conveys that
sincerity skillfully is worthy of reading and as such, I give this book 5
out of 5 camel humps.

Exciting
news for all of you readers: Frankl thinks that your life can be meaningful!
Frankl, a Jewish, Austrian boy born in 1905, practiced as an esteemed
psychologist and neurologist until he and his wife were deported to Auschwitz
in 1944. He spent three years in concentration camps thereafter. Unlike many of
the camp’s prisoners, Frankl was interested in his deplorable environment from
a professional standpoint. As he suffered, he studied his own mind and the
responses of his fellow men and women, hoping that he’d eventually be freed and
have the chance to share his observations. He believed that looking to the
future gave him something to live for, which contributed to his health both
mentally and physically. “In the words of Nietzsche: ‘He who has a Why to live
for can bear almost any How’” (Frankl, ix).

Upon
liberation—an event that he poignantly described—Frankl shared a new kind of
psychotherapy: logotherapy. Logotherapy derives from the belief that “the
striving to find a meaning in one’s life is the primary motivational force in
man” (Frankl, 99). Frankl claims that
when ask ourselves-- Lyndsay, what is the
meaning of life? —we’re asking the wrong question. (When we say – Lyndsay, it obviously involves watching
Breaking Bad while snuggling your dachshunds – we’re giving the wrong
answer). Instead of framing the question in a vague, all encompassing way, we
should be looking at minute moments. Each individual moment is an opportunity
to find meaning in life. Consequently, “meaning” means different things for different people. Frankl explains, “To
put the question in general terms would be comparable to the question posed to
a chess champion: ‘Tell me, Master, what is the best move in the world?’ There
simply is no such thing as the best or even a good move apart from a particular
situation in a game and the particular personality of one’s opponent. The same
holds for human existence” (Frankl, 108). My move is different than your move.
Checkmate, bitches.

Of course,
there’s this whole predestination debacle. Not in the religious sense, but in
the nature-nurture sense-- the notion that how you’re biologically built + what
your upbringing is like= who you are as
a person. Frankl says that based on his experiences at the hands of the Nazis,
he can confidently assert that men are able to act freely in response to their
conditions. Condemnation to a concentration camp does not automatically necessitate
pessimism, death, or meaninglessness. Namely, prisoners can triumph over their
suffering, and in doing so discover a deep inner value and sense of
achievement. According to Frankl, suffering is inevitable. By viewing that
suffering as a challenge and an opportunity to rise above, your life is
rendered meaningful. As Frankl saw all of the horrific agony around him, he
trusted that those who were dying and suffering were still capable of leading
meaningful lives.

In addition
to responding to suffering, logotherapy holds that we can experience meaning in
life through creating/doing and experiencing/encountering others (Frankl, 111).
Thus, his psychotherapy applies to all humans at all points in time. As such,
he imbues even the most mundane choices with great import. In logotherapy, we
have the freedom to act in certain ways. Similar to Spiderman, with great freedom comes great responsibility; you have
a responsibility towards yourself to act in a way that dignifies your life.

The first portion of the book
chronicles his time at the hands of Hitler and the second half introduces a
cohesive ideology that he hopes to relate to the masses. In the former, I was
intrigued in a way that felt almost sadistic. Because I cannot possibly imagine
the awfulness that Frankl and millions of others endured, I am curious,
sympathetic, despondent, and astounded all in one. Truthfully, I have not read much
literature about the Holocaust, and most of my knowledge stems from museums and
history textbooks. I was shocked to learn about the terror of the Capos—prisoners
who were entrusted by SS guards to reign over other prisoners (Frankl, 4). They
were among their own people and yet so many of them exercised their privilege
in the form of immense cruelty. How is this not blatantly evident and advertised
in history books? If it is… how have I not taken that to heart and remembered
it? Man’s Search for Meaning
enlightened me on historical facts of the Holocaust from a first-hand
perspective, and for that I am grateful.

The latter half was existentially
interesting. I have the utmost respect for Frankl; he was a remarkable man (he
passed in 1997 at age 92!) who did a lot of good for a lot of people,
reassuring them of their value in the world. He was an incredibly smart man
with an incredibly impressive moral compass. When speaking of his liberation
and his fellow prisoner’s difficulty in accepting their own fate and the fate
of their tormenters, he states, “no one has the right to do wrong, even if
wrong has been done to them” (Frankl, 91). And I’m over here ready to bitch
slap someone if they stand on the wrong side of the escalator in the city. The
man behind the book deserves 5 out of 5 camel humps.The book itself, admittedly, deserves 3
out of 5 camel humps. As an absurdist, I’m biased. I think that the pursuit
of meaning in life is fundamentally impossible (uplifting, I know). So, I take
what he says with a grain of salt, acknowledging that while I don’t buy what
he’s selling, he still has thought provoking ideas that help me further articulate
what I personally espouse.

Wednesday, December 2, 2015

Over
Thanksgiving break, I embraced my Texas roots and went hunting with my dad and
younger brothers. For my “hunting book”, I chose Wild: From Lost of Found on the Pacific Crest Trail by Cheryl
Strayed.I thought to myself I’m totally just like this woman in the book
who backpacked 1,100 miles through the wilderness because I’m sleeping in a
campervan for three days and peeing outside. The memoir makes for a better
story than my “camping” trip. The run down is as follows: Cheryl is devastated
by the premature and tragically painful death of her mother (Bobbi) who happens
to be her best friend. Her dad was an abusive dick and eventually Bobbi fled
with Cheryl and her two siblings.Bobbi’s single-working-mother status did not dilute her optimism and immense
love for her children. When she passed, Cheryl unraveled as a human being. Her
experimental nature became hazardous as she dabbled with heroin and random,
unprotected sex. Consequentially, her marriage dissolved and her friendships
waned. In order to redeem herself from rock bottom, she decides to hike a
famously challenging West coast trail and regain the “Cheryl Strayed” she had
lost with the loss of her mom. I did not do any heroin while on my hunting trip
(thanks a lot for being so uptight, dad) but I did eat exclusively meat with no
side dishes for every meal, which is probably just as unhealthy.

Incidentally, I snapped this
charming, rugged photo.

I had just sniped a deer (swag) and had to set my book
down while I went to retrieve my future noms. When I returned, I noticed how
picturesque it all looked and couldn’t help capturing the moment. Not pictured:
a dead deer to the right of the frame and the irony that Bobbi was an avid
anti-hunter and animal rights activist.

I read this memoir while in the
deer stand next to my dad. He was probably judging me seeing as I spent most of
the time stifling sniffles because this book is about death, struggle, restoration,
and all those other things that make you feel simultaneously happy and sad. Of
course, I can’t just let my emotions get the best of me when I have to maintain
a hunter-mindset, awaiting unsuspecting animals with bated breath. That’s tough
to do when Cheryl Strayed is making you feel all of the feels.

Some readers will recognize this story
from the 2014 widely praised and aptly named film, Wild. Reese Witherspoon was nominated for an Oscar for her heart
wrenching portrayal of Cheryl. Of note, Witherspoon is a straight stunner and
she manages to pull off the dirt-on-my-face look much better than most. This
might actually be the lone case where the movie is (slightly) better than the
book. The film hardly deviates from the memoir at all and much of the script is
drawn verbatim from the text. While Cheryl’s book offers vivid descriptions of
her environment, I think it’s difficult as a reader to fully comprehend the
magnitude of her journey in the imagination. I think that the treacherous paths
and the physical tolls are more palpably depicted in motion picture format. I
mean, Cheryl’s trip was no joke. She was an inexperienced backpacker (as in,
she had zero experience) and she was poor, so there was no wiggle room for
error as she scraped by on literal nickels and dimes. Her expectations fell
*wildly* short of reality. For example, she assumed that she would average 14
miles a day over the course of the trip but in the first few weeks, she was
only able to pull off a mile an hour pace (Strayed, 64). She also thought that
the hike would be a time of intense personal reflection—a meditation among
nature. Instead, her physical sufferings were so all encompassing that she
could barely focus on anything else but bodily pain. She lost six toenails in
total (as in, they ripped off…) and she collected innumerable bruises from her
undersized boots and oversized backpack. Bravely tackling these ailments made
her a stronger person both physically and mentally.

Not only was the trail difficult,
it was also dangerous. Hiking alone on the trail is perilous. Hiking alone on
the trail as a woman is mega perilous. Yet, she found power from within. Cheryl
says, “Fear, to a great extent, is born of a story we tell ourselves, and so I
chose to tell myself a different story from the one women are told. I decided I
was safe. I was strong. I was brave. Nothing could vanquish me. Insisting on
this story was a form of mind control” (Strayed, 51). She was intimidated by
the trail--with its harsh, unpredictable weather conditions and its bears and
mountain lions and rattlesnakes—but she did not let it crush her. She became a
part of the raw beauty of her surroundings and realized that she too was
beautiful, not just in spite of her mistakes but because of them. Her entire
past had led up to this moment, on that trail, and contributed to the deep
clarity that she felt having traversed the thousand plus miles. She suggests, “What
if I was sorry, but if I could go back in time I wouldn’t do anything
differently than I had done” (Strayed, 258)? Her massive physical and mental
achievements encouraged her to embrace and love her whole self, even the self
that turned to drugs at a time of overwhelming sorrow. Before her expedition,
she dubbed herself “the woman with a hole in her heart”; afterwards, she had
earned the name “Queen of the PCT” by her fellow hikers (Strayed, 299).

Because the film captures Cheryl’s
despair and transformation so well, I give it 5 out of 5 camel humps. Clearly,
though, the movie would not exist without the book. I have deep respect for
Cheryl Strayed for what she endured and how she came out the other side. Her
triumphs are truly inspirational. Still, in comparison to how the movie stirred
my heartstrings, I give the book 4 out of 5 camel humps. Strayed is a
remarkable writer (and an ardent reader!)
but if you don’t like to read, the film is a perfectly acceptable replacement. Here's the link to the trailer if you want to check it out for yourself: *Trailer*

*Strayed, Cheryl. Wild:
From lost to found on the Pacific Crest Trail. New York: Random House,
2012. Print.

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Lyndsay West

About Me

I’m a 25 year old lover of reading and writing. I was born and raised in Dallas, Texas, and I graduated from the University of Virginia in 2013. Currently, I live in New York City making my writing mark on the world via freelance work. Other interests include religious studies, philosophy, psychology, dancing, and live music.

Follow my twitter: @humpdayhardback

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